


Somewhere In Time

by dyad (johnnycake)



Series: In the Bleak Midwinter... [6]
Category: Peaky Blinders (TV)
Genre: Angst, Death, F/M, season 5 inspo
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-26
Updated: 2019-08-26
Packaged: 2020-10-01 20:43:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 974
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20399554
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/johnnycake/pseuds/dyad
Summary: He drinks just enough to see her in the dark.





	Somewhere In Time

**Author's Note:**

> alright before any of y'all have a conniption, i'm gonna write way more for this couple, so miri certainly ain't dead yet. i just saw the season 5 premiere and i'm a fucking mess, so i had to take advantage of it.
> 
> if you're new to this series, please make sure to read the series notes!!

The fire crackled in the dark, creating a wavering circle of illumination that couldn’t be seen on due to the brilliance of the flames. They blocked out any stars that could be seen, blocked out all visual warnings of enemy approach should one decide to appear in the endless dirt fields that seemed to stretch out for an eternity in every direction from the fire, a single bright beacon in the dark. Tommy was well aware that anything could’ve existed beyond the light and in the black, but whatever it was didn’t matter to him.

Nothing mattered anymore.

Nothing had for a good long time.

If someone had asked Tommy how long it had been since Miri died, he was unsure if he could answer the question in any certain terms. He knew how much physical time had passed since she’d breathed her last if that was what they wanted to know. He knew how many days it had been since her funeral. He knew how many physical hours had passed since he’d put her in the ground.

And yet, at the same time, all of those factual timetables sounded incorrect, wrong, because he was certain no time had passed at all and also that too much time had passed already.

Every morning, he awoke, thinking maybe today the pain that gripped his heart, that made it difficult to breathe, would be a bit less. And every morning as he gasped his way into wakefulness, his dreams full of nothing but ghosts and shadows and memories, he found that the pain wasn’t less at all. It was incrementally worse.

He floated through the days, drinking enough to make the pain a dull throb rather than a stabbing ache, steadily marking off the days on the calendar, realizing it had been two weeks without her, then four, then a month, then two months. And still the pain never got better. It only got worse and worse and worse and worse.

At night, he’d found if he drank just enough he could hear Miri singing to him in Roma. He could feel her arms around him and her face pressed against his, he could smell her hair and sometimes, if he listened very, very close, he could hear her laugh too, the sound of tinkling bells, echoing on and on forever and ever, and for just a moment...nothing hurt at all.

Then he would open his eyes and reality would come crashing back in.

What scared him the most was that someday he would forget what her voice sounded like, he would forget her laugh, and then all he would hear was silence.

Then she would be truly dead.

And he would be truly alone.

He didn’t keep track of time anymore. He wasn’t sure he could. His pocket watch was somewhere in his bedroom, long forgotten. The only measurements that mattered were counting moments she was not with him and counting the moments he wished she was so desperately that no amount of alcohol could save him from the pain of it.

There was only one way to bring her back to him he’d discovered. And that was why he was sitting alone in a dirt field in the dead of night, staring into the fire, wondering if giving himself to the flames would hurt more or less than this slow death of being without her.

He’d taken his horse, riding him out into the middle of nowhere, far from Small Heath, far from anyone who tried to tell him that drinking so much would solve nothing. And now here he sat, a half full bottle of whiskey on one side of him, a loaded pistol on the other.

“You know Polly’s right. Drinking so much isn’t good for you, Thomas.”

Tommy closed his eyes, letting out a heavy breath. “Why would I stop,” he asked, his words more breath than voice, “when it brings me back you?”

He turned his head and opened his eyes and there she was, looking how she had at her funeral, her dress pure white, her long dark hair pinned up with a few strands having come loose. The only difference was she looked as she had before she’d gotten sick. She wasn’t deathly pale. She wasn’t so thin she was only bones. Her cheeks were rosy red and she was small, but not unhealthily so.

Tommy reached out, his hand touching her cheek. Miri’s eyes closed and she brought both of her hands up, covering his, pressing her face into his hand.

Only whiskey could make this happen.

Why on earth would he ever stop?

Her eyes opened, her deep brown eyes looking into his strikingly blue ones. “You take it to stop the pain too, Thomas,” she replied, her voice as soft as his. “You can’t forget me.”

“No,” he agreed, leaning forward, pressing his face against hers, “no, I can’t. I told you I wouldn’t. You’re my heart, Miri. I died with you. Now I’m only passing time.”

_Until I can join you._

Miri’s fingers went up into his hair.

He couldn’t stop himself from letting out a gasp.

It felt so real.

“And I swore I’d never leave you,” she whispered, her lips were so close to his ear he could feel them move. “I swore I’d be here as long as you need me.”

“I’ll need you forever.”

He waited for her to answer, but she never did.

Slowly and then all at once, he realized he couldn’t feel her face against his anymore.

He opened his eyes.

He was, again, alone.

His hands curled into fists, digging his nails into his palms until they bled.

She was gone. She had been gone for nearly two months now.

She would remain gone forever.

It took everything in him not to scream himself hoarse.

**Author's Note:**

> there's gonna be more fics like this one, so prepare for suffering


End file.
